Business
PFAS not just a La Crosse problem, as national interest group proposes road map for dealing with “forever” chemicals in water supply
Whoever wins the next presidential election will be urged to take action against PFAS “forever chemicals” pollution.
The Environmental Working Group (EWG) proposed a road map of actions that federal government can take to limit pollution and clean up in water supplies, such as on La Crosse’s French Island.
During a nationwide online conference Thursday, Melanie Benesh with the EWG said more action should be taken against polluters.
“We also need to do much more to hold these polluters accountable for the harms that they have caused,” Benesh said, “including increased enforcement when polluters break the law, and also greater access to justice” for the causing harm to communities.
Firefighting foam used for years at the La Crosse Regional Airport has been blamed for widespread PFAS contamination on French Island wells, forcing many families there to rely on bottled water for four years now.
Another EWG representative, Scott Faber, said companies which produced PFAS chemicals have been slow to respond to the problem, which he calls “disgusting.”
“They’ve made tens of billions of dollars knowingly poisoning literally every creature on the planet,” Faber said, “and instead of standing with all of us to say, ‘It’s time to have a drinking water standard, it’s time to properly dispose of PFAS wastes, it’s time to end needless uses of PFAS,’ they’re fighting to maintain the status quo.”
The group calls on Congress and federal agencies to take urgent steps to halt PFAS pollution and clean up the contamination.
walden
August 15, 2024 at 11:59 pm
Sorry, the County is too occupied with DEI and the City is too busy “solving homelessness” to bother with PFAS.
LG
August 16, 2024 at 1:00 pm
Walden, the county is busy “solving homelessness” too and messing around with DEI. They appear ready to Repeat all the mistakes made by the city of La Crosse. And it was the city run airport fire department that spread PFAS all over the airport which found its way into the town of Campbell groundwater. Of course they did that under federal mandate to practice putting out fires where no fire existed.
nick
August 27, 2024 at 5:22 am
The problem is that in the event of a forced landing of a plane there could be a tough choice.
Water does not work on gasoline or electric fires. You either put the chemicals down or watch the plane burn up with the passengers.
The Republican led legislature is immoral in not releasing the funds to solve the problem for Campbell and others.
The problem of how to environmentally solve the problem and protect people is still there.